(Phys.org)—Creating 3D visualizations of hydrogen atoms in proteins is especially challenging, often requiring their locations to be inferred from those of nearby carbon, nitrogen, oxygen or sulfur atoms ...

(Phys.org) —Chemical engineers at Stanford have designed a catalyst that could help produce vast quantities of pure hydrogen through electrolysis – the process of passing electricity through water to ...

(PhysOrg.com) -- Until now polyurethane has been considered non-biodegradable, but a group of students from Yale University in the US has found fungi that will not only eat and digest it, they will do so even in the absence ...

Researchers from North Carolina State University are using a technique they developed to observe minute distortions in the atomic structure of complex materials, shedding light on what causes these distortions ...

An international team of scientists, including a University of York researcher, has carried out ground-breaking experiments to investigate the atomic structure of astatine (Z=85), the rarest naturally occurring ...

(Phys.org)—A team of Stanford chemists and engineers has created the first synthetic material that is both sensitive to touch and capable of healing itself quickly and repeatedly at room temperature. The ...

University of Utah chemists discovered how vibrations in chemical bonds can be used to predict chemical reactions and thus design better catalysts to speed reactions that make medicines, industrial products ...

(Phys.org) —A new class of molecules called acyldepsipeptides—ADEPs—may provide a new way to attack bacteria that have developed resistance to antibiotics. Researchers at Brown and MIT have discovered ...

Northwestern University graduate student Jonathan Barnes had a hunch for creating an exotic new chemical compound, and his idea that the force of love is stronger than hate proved correct. He and his colleagues are the first ...

An unlikely material, cubic boron arsenide, could deliver an extraordinarily high thermal conductivity – on par with the industry standard set by costly diamond – researchers report in the current issue of the journal ...

(Phys.org)—It would seem that figuring out how many molecules of water are needed to form the smallest, or most basic ice crystal would have been discovered long ago, but that is not the case, because to ...

(Phys.org)—The electronics of the future could use molecules to do their arithmetic. The tiny particles could then take over the tasks which are presently done by silicon transistors, for example. Researchers ...

Light changes matter in ways that shape our world. Photons trigger changes in proteins in the eye to enable vision; sunlight splits water into hydrogen and oxygen and creates chemicals through photosynthesis; ...

Chemical bond

A chemical bond is the physical process responsible for the attractive interactions between atoms and molecules, and that which confers stability to diatomic and polyatomic chemical compounds. The explanation of the attractive forces is a complex area that is described by the laws of quantum electrodynamics. In practice, however, chemists usually rely on quantum theory or qualitative descriptions that are less rigorous but more easily explained to describe chemical bonding. In general, strong chemical bonding is associated with the sharing or transfer of electrons between the participating atoms. Molecules, crystals, and diatomic gases—indeed most of the physical environment around us—are held together by chemical bonds, which dictate the structure of matter.

Bonds vary widely in their strength which is associated both with the energy required to break them, and the forces they exert on the atoms they hold together. Generally covalent and ionic bonds are often described as "strong", whereas hydrogen bonds and van der Waals' bonds are generally considered to be "weak," although there exist overlaps in strength within these bond classes.

Since opposite charges attract via a basic electromagnetic force, the negatively-charged electrons orbiting the nucleus and the positively-charged protons in the nucleus attract each other. Also, an electron positioned between two nuclei will be attracted to both of them. Thus, the most stable configuration of nuclei and electrons is one in which the electrons spend more time between nuclei, than anywhere else in space. These electrons cause the nuclei to be attracted to each other. However, this assembly cannot collapse to a size dictated by the volumes of these individual particles. Due to the matter wave nature of electrons and their relatively smaller mass, they occupy a very much larger amount of volume compared with the nuclei, and this volume occupied by the electrons keeps the atomic nuclei relatively far apart, as compared with the size of the nuclei themselves.

In the simplest view of a so-called covalent bond, one or more electrons (often a pair of electrons) are drawn into the space between the two atomic nuclei. Here the negatively charged electrons are attracted to the positive charges of both nuclei, instead of just their own. This overcomes the repulsion between the two positively charged nuclei of the two atoms, and so this overwhelming attraction holds the two nuclei in a relatively fixed configuration of equilibrium, even though they will still vibrate at equilibrium position. In summary, covalent bonding involves sharing of electrons in which the positively charged nuclei of two or more atoms simultaneously attract the negatively charged electrons that are being shared. In a polar covalent bond, one or more electrons are unequally shared between two nuclei.

In a simplified view of an ionic bond, the bonding electron is not shared at all, but transferred. In this type of bond, the outer atomic orbital of one atom has a vacancy which allows addition of one or more electrons. These newly added electrons potentially occupy a lower energy-state (effectively closer to more nuclear charge) than they experience in a different atom. Thus, one nucleus offers a more tightly-bound position to an electron than does another nucleus, with the result that one atom may transfer an electron to the other. This transfer causes one atom to assume a net positive charge, and the other to assume a net negative charge. The bond then results from electrostatic attraction between atoms, and the atoms become positive or negatively charged ions.

All bonds can be explained by quantum theory, but, in practice, simplification rules allow chemists to predict the strength, directionality, and polarity of bonds. The octet rule and VSEPR theory are two examples. More sophisticated theories are valence bond theory which includes orbital hybridization and resonance, and the linear combination of atomic orbitals molecular orbital method which includes ligand field theory. Electrostatics are used to describe bond polarities and the effects they have on chemical substances.